Bill Keating proudly represents Massachusetts’s 9th District. As the Chairman of Europe, Eurasia, Energy, and the Environment Subcommittee on the House Foreign Affairs Committee and as a member of the House Armed Services Committee, he is a Congressional authority on terrorism and national security. As a resident of Cape Cod, he knows firsthand the urgency of providing communities with coastal resiliency resources and protecting environmental conservation efforts.
Throughout his entire career – from time as a member of the Massachusetts legislature to Norfolk County District Attorney to now in Congress – Bill has supported responsible gun control legislation. He supports background checks before all gun purchases, in addition to stemming illegal possession or transfer of firearms and improving safety technologies like personalized weapons and trigger locks.
Bill strongly opposes the legal availability of high-capacity, military-grade firearms, which are strictly weapons of war. He is an active member of the Congressional Gun Violence Prevention Task Force, which was formed in the wake of the horrific mass shooting in Newtown, Connecticut. The Task Force seeks ways of reducing and preventing gun violence.
He has cosponsored numerous pieces of legislation that would institute common-sense gun laws, including the Large Capacity Ammunition Feeding Device Act, the Fire Sale Loophole Closing Act,the Fix Gun Checks Act, and the Gun Trafficking Prevention Act.The Large Capacity Ammunition Feeding Device Act prohibits the trade and manufacture of dangerous, high-capacity ammunition like that which was used in the horrifying attacks in Newtown, Connecticut, Tuscon, Arizona, and Aurora, Colorado. The Fire Sale Loophole Closing Act aims to close the so-called “Fire Sale Loophole” in gun sales by preventing anyone whose firearms license has been revoked or denied from transferring firearms into a personal collection or to an employee. The Fix Gun Checks Act would ensure that all individuals who should be prohibited from buying a firearm are listed in the national instant criminal background check system and require a background check for every firearm sale. And the Gun Trafficking Prevention Act would criminalize the transfer of firearms to individuals prohibited from possessing a firearm or providing false or misleading information on an ATF transaction form.
As Ranking Member of the Terrorism Subcommittee, Bill has strongly advocated for the passage of the Denying Firearms and Explosives to Dangerous Terrorists Act of 2015, which would prevent a known or suspected terrorist from purchasing a firearm or explosives.
Bill is also a supporter of innovative ways to make legal gun use safer. The Personalized Handgun Safety Act provides funding for research into the technology to produce personalized handguns which may only be operated by the authorized user.
Mass shootings occur at a rate of more than once a day in this country. Bill firmly believes that this is an epidemic that needs to be addressed immediately.